University Project Status Reporting: Challenges and Differences

This report examines the complexities of project status reporting, focusing on the challenges and potential pitfalls that can undermine the process. It identifies issues such as the reliability of team members, the risk of misreporting, the impact of ineffective auditing, the influence of senior executives, and the omission of limitations. The report also differentiates between the formats and content required for status reports intended for project teams, sponsors, and steering committees, emphasizing the unique information needs of each group. For project teams, the report highlights the importance of detailing stakeholder requirements, timelines, and resource needs. For sponsors, it stresses the inclusion of funding aspects and project progress overviews. Finally, for steering committees, it underscores the need for comprehensive coverage of project scope, scheduling, resources, and budget to facilitate informed decision-making. The report uses references to support the analysis and provides insights into improving project communication and management practices.

Running head: Project Status Reporting
REPORT
ON
PROJECT STATUS REPORTING
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note:

1Status Reporting
Discuss the Challenges and Pitfalls of different status reports.
Project status report stands for the representation of the project development status of
a certain period of time. In other words project status reporting is a process in which it will
prepare a document by describing the project status which has been developed till the time in
order to provide the knowledge to the stakeholders of the project. The purpose behind
developing a project status report is to provide an assurance to the stakeholders that the
objectives of the projects are being met in a timely manner. However, apart from these
benefits there are several pitfalls present while preparing a project status report. Detail
elaboration on those pitfalls are mentioned below:
 The reliability factor on the employees who are present in a project development team as
they might not react at the time when they face problems which stands to represent the risk
factors, which has stated that a team lead or project manager excepts from the team
members to react when any sort of problem occurs during project development phase.
However, studies has proven that most of the team members does not bother when any
blunders happen. This can cause a significant impact on the project development process
(Kerzner 2017).
 The possibility to prepare a misreport to represent a project status cannot be avoided.
According to several studies it has been observed that some of the project executive has
the tendency to provide false report during project development phase. The reason behind
this action is to provide wrong information about the project report to the stakeholders in
order to protect the team from any serious consequences from the leading stakeholders.
 Along with that the risk factor related to the performance of a less effective auditing team
also cannot be ignored as this an improper auditing team will not be able to find the
misreporting aspects from a project status report.

2Status Reporting
 Apart from the above aspect the pitfall caused by the incorporation of any senior executive
in the project development plan also cannot considered with less priority as studies has
proven that the incorporation of senior executives in a project development team causes a
significant blunder while providing a project status report to the stakeholders. The reason
behind this step is that a senior executive has an experience on the project development, so
it can cause blunders related to the resources as well as the influence of the politics are
also present there. Thus, it invokes the aspect of project misreporting (Milosevic et al.,
2016).
 Followed by the above aspects there is another significant problem which invokes the
aspect of project misreporting. That problem states that most of the time the project
reporting team does not mention the limitations while developing a project. Thus it can be
stated that due to this action the final project can get highly effected (Therivel et al., 2013).
Explain the difference between the status reports provided for teams,
sponsor and steering committee.
While preparing a project status report there is significant change between the
reporting format while sending it to the team members, steering committee as well as to the
sponsors. The detail explanation of the key value of the reporting formation is mentioned
below:
 While preparing any project status report for the team leader or team members of any
project it must consist a detail idea about the requirement of the stakeholders as well as the
expected time must be mentioned as this will help the project team to schedule their
activities. Along with that this report must include a thorough investigation of the project
risk as well as the resources which is required for the development of this project as it will

3Status Reporting
help the project team to determine whether the provided resources are enough or not in
order to deploy the desire product (Kerzner & Kerzner 2017).
 While preparing a project status report for the sponsor of the project it must include the
aspects related to the funding as well as the limitations must be mentioned in the format.
Along with that the project status report must consist an overview of the project progress
as well as it should also have the detail of the aspects in which the project team is to
capable to resolve the problem followed by this report the sponsor of the project will get
an idea about the project progress as well as it will help to get knowledge about the
occurred problems which are being faced by the project development team while
developing the project. Thus, after analysing this report the project sponsors will be able to
take necessary action in order to fulfil the requirements (Kemp & Bossarte 2013).
 While developing a project status report for the steering committee of the project it is
essential to meet all the positive as well as the negative aspects present in the development
of the proposed project. Thus, the status report must cover the aspects related to the project
scope, project scheduling, utilized resources as well as the aspects related to the budget of
the project. The purpose behind mentioning these aspects in the status report for the
steering committee is to provide a brief knowledge about the progress report of the project
as well as the limitations related to the project development in order to help the steering
committee to take effective decision for the betterment of the project (Dang et al., 2014).

4Status Reporting
Reference:
Dang, X., Scotcher, J., Wu, S., Chu, R. K., Tolić, N., Ntai, I., ... & Durbin, K. R. (2014). The
first pilot project of the consortium for top‐down proteomics: a status
report. Proteomics, 14(10), 1130-1140.
Kemp, J., & Bossarte, R. (2013). Suicide data report: 2012. Washington, DC: Department of
Veterans Affairs, Mental Health Services, Suicide Prevention Program.
Kerzner, H. (2017). Project management metrics, KPIs, and dashboards: a guide to
measuring and monitoring project performance. John Wiley & Sons.
Kerzner, H., & Kerzner, H. R. (2017). Project management: a systems approach to planning,
scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Milosevic, D. Z., & Martinelli, R. J. (2016). Project management toolbox: tools and
techniques for the practicing project manager. John Wiley & Sons.
Therivel, R., & Paridario, M. R. (2013). The practice of strategic environmental assessment.
Routledge.